Students in online courses continue to feel disconnected, frustrated, isolated, and anxious even as they continue to enroll in online courses. This contradiction presents a puzzling challenge for online instructors in higher education contexts. Using microethnographic methods, this case study explores how instructors and students emotionally engage in online spaces. Using video recordings as primary data sources, we inquire into the online interactions of participants. Data analysis revealed how emotion was linguistically, visibly, and verbally managed through chat comments and emojis, physical gestures, and video feeds. Additionally, instructors and students suggest that online connection is fatiguing. We hope by highlighting the textual, visible, and verbal exchanges of emotion, instructors, and students can reduce emotional distance and fatigue in online classrooms. Additionally, by highlighting and utilizing text-based exchanges of emotion, we hope our findings help instructors and students feel more connected and encouraged to teach and learn in online spaces.